I often hear people ask what the benefits of inner work are beyond feeling better about myself. It almost seems irrelevant looking out at the world today when we look at the many problems facing the human race and our inability to agree on a baseline of what constitutes facts.

It can leave one feeling perplexed and wanting to do more but unsure of what they can contribute beyond time or money donated to a favorite charity. Or, all too often, we overcompensate in seeking to address the perceived imbalance by doing everything in our power to move the pendulum in the opposite direction. In either stance, it feels like no matter what, there is always something more in the queue.

Alchemy is a dual science composed of both practical physical work and an inner aspect in the realm preceding the physical that acts as its foundation. All the ideas we use to construct our physical reality have their issuance from this inner world.

The call to inner work is not a call to the cessation of action but instead laying the delineated foundation within which the effort propagates. If you have not developed the ability to converse with your internal forces, especially those of resistance to a thing, your actions often unwittingly perpetuate the vitality of the very thing you do not want.

If we are propelled into action from a place of emotion like worry or fear, then it’s a sure bet we are doing something to aid the very thing we claim to be opposed to. That sounds counterintuitive because reacting emotionally to stressful situations is natural. But when we stay in that space without understanding it, without being able to see within its supposed umbra, we are blind to its ability to manipulate the situation. This truth is central irrespective of our operating from a personal or community perspective.

“Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves. One does not become enlightened [illuminated] by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious. Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate.” These were not just poetic words by Carl Jung but the keys to bringing about change.

If you want things to change, you have to understand what within you is causing that prompting for change or action. If you cringe at its visage or its countenance continually drives you into blind reaction, then you are in that thing's direction.

Alchemy is about transmutation, not excising. To make an effective change, you need to work from a higher-level perspective that unites the two seemingly opposing aspects, one that seeks balance through a means other than conflict. When you can behold and understand that which used to cause fear, anger, or worry within, you have conscious access to that energy.

Your development of inner mastery has far-reaching implications beyond yourself because of your increasing sphere of influence. We've all experienced spheres of influence when we walk into a room and can feel the emotion of the room, be it happy or tense. That feeling in the room can often be traced back to one person.

When present times and conditions present challenging emotional stimuli, it is the one who can look at the faces of their inner shadow, whose visages were elicited by external stimuli. This person knows those faces to be an integral part of themselves and thus directs and emanates out waves of current consciously that others call fate. Those waves move in concentric circles, each touching and resonating with another person creating a chain reaction.

To be continued.